Syllabus: General Studies Paper 3

Context:

The Gross Enrollment Ratio (GER) for higher education, which is the percentage of the population between the ages of 18-23 who are enrolled, is now 27 per cent.

• GER is the number of students enrolled in a given level of education, regardless of age, expressed as a percentage of the official school-age population corresponding to the same level of education.
• The enhanced enrollment of students from weak socio-economic backgrounds is primarily a result of the extension of reservations to OBCs and EWS. 
• In addition, the massive increase in the number of higher education institutions has led to an enlargement of the number of available seats. There are more than 45,000 universities and colleges in the country. 
• A majority of the students are aiming to get some kind of a government job posts their degree. 
• And, this is where there is a huge mismatch between students’ aspirations and what they are likely to attain.

Concerns:

• Employment opportunities in the government have not increased proportionally and may, in fact, have decreased with increased contractualisation. 
  • Even in the private sector, though the jobs have increased with economic growth, most of the jobs are contractual. 
• Unemployment: One in every five Indian who graduate (or even better) is unemployed. It is almost as if the economy penalises you for getting educated.
  • In comparison, those with graduation (or even higher degrees) face almost three-times the unemployment level.
• Low paying jobs: The highest increase in jobs is at the lowest end, especially in the services sector — delivery boys for e-commerce or fast food for instance. 
  • A student who has finished his college against all odds is not very keen to take up a job in a call centre or worse as a delivery agent for e-commerce or fast food.
• On the one hand, companies in India face an acute shortage of skilled manpower and, on the other, India has millions of educated unemployed.The industry always complains about the shortage of skilled labour in the country. 
• Social unrest: There is a huge pool of unemployed university graduates with unfulfilled aspirations. This group of dissatisfied, disgruntled youth can lead to disastrous consequences for our society.
• Over 90% of India’s workforce is in the informal sector. India is trapped in a vicious cycle: Greater workforce informality leads to lower incentives to acquire new skills. 
  • Faced with inadequately skilled workers, businesses often choose replacing labour with machinery. 
  • That’s because “skilled labour and technology are complementary, but unskilled labour and technology are substitutes”. This, in turn, leads to still fewer formal jobs.
• Millions of Indians who work in agriculture continue to subsist because they do not have the skills to take up industrial or services sector jobs even as these sectors themselves have failed to create adequate job opportunities.
• Poor quality of ITIs: Industrial Training Institutes (ITI) and Industrial Training Centers (ITC) are post-secondary schools in India constituted under Directorate General of Training (DGT), Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, Union Government to provide training in various trades.
  • There are more than 15,000 Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs) in the country currently. 
  • These institutions provide training in various trades like air conditioning mechanic, electrician, mechanic etc. 
  • The quality of these of course is very uneven. 
  • They are also, by and large, poorly maintained and lacking in resources, both physical and human. 
  • The curriculum remains outdated and has not been upgraded to include some of the newer skills like maintaining networking and telecom equipment.
• There is a huge competition for admission into these institutions, and polytechnics. 
  • In some places, it is harder to get into these than to get admission to the local government college.
  • Manufacturing units prefer hiring them for blue-collar jobs since they at least have the least training. 
  • In addition, the pass-outs from ITIs also have the option of being self-employed in the various service-related sectors.
• A distinct disadvantage with India’s approach towards skilling has been to ignore the demands of the market. For the most part, skills have been provided in a top-down fashion. Thus, most skilling efforts focus almost solely on providing certain skills but fail to “match” them with the needs of the market.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 3

Context:

Experts may differ on the weightage to be given to the various reasons cited for the coal shortage earlier this month, but all will agree that the blame cannot be placed on the doors of anyone entity or ministry. 

• India’s coal reserve is of generally 28-30 days but due to disruption in supply chains induced by monsoons and inflated global prices, the reserve has fallen to 10-14 days.
• Such shortages invariably lead to outages, some of which are already being witnessed in some pockets of the country. Demand surges and disruption in supplies can exacerbate the issue.

Responsibility for the coal crisis:

• The Ministry of Coal and Coal India mismanaged the production process, planning supplies or leaving vacant crucial leadership positions. But they should not be made to carry the blame alone. 
• The Ministry of Power/NTPC should also accept responsibility. For they allowed coal inventories to fall below the recommended minimum in an effort to better manage their working capital. 
  • But they can claim they had no other option because the state government electricity distribution companies (discoms) to whom they sell power do not pay their dues on time or fully. 
• The discoms point a finger at their political bosses, who compel them to sell electricity to residential and agricultural sector consumers at subsidised tariffs that do not fully cover the costs of procurement. 
  • This cycle of blame is the result of a structural lacuna. 

No single unified system

• There is no one public body at the central or state government level with executive oversight, responsibility and accountability for the entirety of the coal value chain. This is a lacuna that afflicts the entire energy sector. 
  • It will need to be filled to not only prevent a recurrence of another coal crisis but also for the country to realise its “green” ambition.
• The word “energy” is not part of the political or administrative dictionary. As a result, there is no energy strategy with the imprimatur of executive authority. 
  • The NITI Aayog has produced an energy strategy. But it has no executive authority and, as was the case with the Planning Commission document “Integrated Energy Policy” published in 2006. 
  • But most of its recommendations are useless because their implementation will depend on the responses of the bureaucrats in various ministries (viz petroleum, coal, renewables and power) who, in general, have little incentive to do so.
  • The Planning Commission document was endorsed by the Cabinet and yet the majority of the recommendations were ignored.

Way forward:

• Decarbonisation of economy: A decarbonised economy is based on low-carbon power sources that therefore has a minimal output of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions into the atmosphere.
  • India faces an energy and environmental problem. 
  • The incremental requirement of India’s energy should come from renewable energy. The Prime Minister recently announced  that by 2030, India’s energy basket would have 40 percent of its needs from the renewable sector.
  • In addition to traditional sectors, India is also looking at future sources of energy.
  • Identifying hydrogen as a priority area for India, India should work quickly on the hydrogen mission. 
  • The Union Budget for 2021-22 has announced a National Hydrogen Energy Mission (NHM) that will draw up a road map for using hydrogen as an energy source.The initiative has the potential of transforming transportation.
  • The usage of hydrogen will not only help India in achieving its emission goals under the Paris Agreement, but will also reduce import dependency on fossil fuels.
  • India’s early efforts at CNG (compressed natural gas) blending with Hydrogen in Delhi in the transportation sector is an example.
• Statutory law for energy: The government should pass an Act captioned “The Energy Responsibility and Security Act.” 
  • This Act should elevate the significance of energy by granting it constitutional sanctity; it should embed in law, India’s responsibility to provide citizens access to secure, affordable and clean energy.
  • It should lay out measurable metrics for monitoring the progress towards the achievement of energy independence, energy security, energy efficiency and “green” energy. 
  • In essence, the Act should provide the constitutional mandate and frame for the formulation and execution of an integrated energy policy.
• Creation of an omnibus Ministry of Energy to oversee the currently siloed verticals of the ministries of petroleum, coal, renewables and power. Such a ministry did exist in the early 1980s (without petroleum). 
  • The minister-in-charge should rank on equal footing with the ministers of defence, finance, home and external affairs. 
  • The PM can establish an executive department within his office; it could be referred to as the “Department of Energy Resources, Security, and Sustainability”, headed by a person of minister of state rank. 
  • The objective would be to formulate and execute an integrated energy policy, to leverage the weight of “India Energy Inc” and maximise India’s competitiveness in its dealing with the international energy community. 
  • It would, de facto, be the most powerful executive body with ultimate responsibility for navigating the “green transition”.

Industrialisation has closely followed our ability to move quickly between vast distances. With the dependence of humanity on fossil fuels, a new international power order also emerged — countries that exported oil.

• The Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) comprises Algeria, Angola, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Nigeria, the Republic of the Congo, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Venezuela.
• The dominant power or de facto leader of OPEC is Saudi Arabia, ruled by the House of Saud.
• In each of these countries. ruling oligarchies were enriched by the oil wealth that flowed in, while their people may not have quite benefitted.

Context:

In November 2019, the Ministry of Jal Shakti had set up a committee to draft the new National Water Policy (NWP).

• The earlier NWPs of 1987, 2002 and 2012 were drafted entirely within the government system.
• This was the first time that the government asked a committee of independent experts to draft the policy.
• The committee is chaired by Mihir Shah (former Planning Commission member and a water expert) and comprises 10 principal members.

Salient features of Draft National Water Policy (2020)

• The policy recognises limits to endlessly increasing water supply and proposes a shift towards demand management.
  • Irrigation consumes 80-90 per cent of India’s water,most of which is used by rice, wheat and sugarcane.
  • Without a radical change in this pattern of water demand, the basic water needs of millions of people cannot be met.
  • Thus, crop diversification is the single most important step in resolving India’s water crisis.
  • The policy suggests diversifying public procurement operations to include nutri-cereals, pulses and oilseeds.

This would incentivise farmers to diversify their cropping patterns, resulting in huge savings of water.

Recently, at the 6th Eastern Economic Forum (EEF) in Russia’s Vladivostok, the Indian Prime Minister said that India-Russia energy partnership can help bring stability to the global energy market.

• Indian and Russian Energy Ministers announced that the countries’ companies have been pushing for greater cooperation in the oil and gas sector beyond the U.S.$32 billion already invested in joint projects.
• India’s Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas referred to Russia as the largest investor in India’s energy sector.

Significance of India-Russia energy cooperation

• Act Far East Policy: Earlier, the Prime Minister of India has also launched India’s ‘Act Far East’ policy, aiming to tap resources potential in the region and find opportunities for employment and development in the region.
  • India and Russia, also agreed for a sea linkbetween Vladivostok, the capital of Russian Far East and Chennai. It will help in tying up with the Indo-Pacific concept and opens up possibilities for India to connect with northern Europe using an Arctic Route.
• Renewable, nuclear energy: In efforts to transition to green energy, India has recently achieved a significant milestone of completing the countrywide installation of 100 gigawatts of total installed renewable energy capacity, excluding large hydro.
  • It now aims to hit 175 GW of renewable energy targets by December 2022. If achieved, that would be close to half of India’s current total installed power capacity.
  • However, unknowns of climate change and threats of a new pandemic suggest that the country should accelerate its energy transition.
  • Russia, one of the key global playersacross the energy market, could emerge as an indispensable partner for such a transition.
  • Russian companies have been involved in the construction ofsix nuclear reactors in the Kudankulam nuclear power project at Tamil Nadu.
  • Furthermore, India and Russia can securethe potential of designing a nuclear reactor specifically for developing countries, which is a promising area of cooperation.

Recently, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, China’s ceremonial but top legislative body, passed a new land law for the “protection and exploitation of the country’s land border areas” which will come into effect from 1st January 2022.

Two perspective of the law

• The law is not meant specifically for the border with India; however, the 3,488-km boundary remains disputed, and some experts feel it could create further hurdles in the resolution of the 17-month-long military standoff.
• Others think the law is just words — what has vexed ties is not domestic Chinese legislation, but their actions on the ground.

The Chinese law

• It states that the sovereignty and territorial integrity of China are sacred and inviolable, and asks the state to take measures to safeguard territorial integrity and land boundaries and guard against and combat any act that undermines (these).
• The state can take measures to: 
  • Strengthen border defence,
  • Support economic and social development and Opening-up in border areas,
  • Improve public services and infrastructure in such areas,
  • Encouraging and supporting people’s life and work there, and
  • Promoting coordination between border defence.
• In effect, this suggests a push to settle civilians in the border areas. However, the law also asks the state to follow the principles of equality, mutual trust, and friendly consultation, and handle land border related-affairs with neighbouring countries through negotiations to properly resolve disputes and longstanding border issues.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 2

Context:

India’s boundary dispute with China is intrinsically linked to Tibet. New Delhi’s recognition of Chinese sovereignty over Tibet was contingent upon China’s acceptance of Tibetan autonomy. 

• The Dalai Lama gave up the quest for independence in exchange for genuine autonomy. Beijing has squashed autonomy and has not kept its side of the bargain with Tibet and India.
• Beijing has squashed autonomy and has not kept its side of the bargain with Tibet and India. 
• In 1965, Prime Minister LalBahadurShastri had informed the Tibet Government in Exile (TGE) that he would recognise it, but he died prematurely. 
• But the original sin was committed by India’s failure to prevent the annexation of Tibet, India’s vital area. 

Background:

• Following a brief military conflict between China and Tibet at the start of the 20th century, Tibet declared itself as an independent nation in 1912. 
• It functioned as an autonomous region until 1950. 
• In 1949, the Communists under Mao Zedong’s leadership gained power and in 1950 seized control of Tibet. 
• In 1951, the Dalai Lama’s representatives signed a seventeen-point agreement that granted China sovereignty over Tibet for the first time. 
• The Chinese claim that this document is proof of Chinese sovereignty over Tibet while Tibet says that it was coerced into signing this document.
• When China invaded Tibet on October 7, 1950, to incorporate Tibet into the just proclaimed People’s Republic of China, it presented India with an acute dilemma – what should newly independent India do?
  • The 17-point agreement signed between Tibet and China on May 23, 1951, ended any hopes of genuine autonomy for Tibet. 
  • Further, the signing of the 1954 India-China agreement symbolised the complete formalisation of all developments since the invasion of Tibet by China and the total elimination of Indian political influence in Tibet.
  • For the first time ever, India, in a formal document, recognised Tibet as an integral part of China.

Chinese strategy

• Negotiations between India and China on relations between India and Tibet opened in Beijing on December 31, 1953. 
• China had suggested in September 1951 that India’s position in Tibet should be regularised and the ‘boundary with Tibet stabilised’. 
• China wanted to redefine the boundary with India. 
• India was clearly inviting trouble when it was decided that the border issue would not figure in the negotiations on Tibet. 
• Responding positively to the Chinese move for an agreement on Tibet was seen essentially as a means of reducing Chinese pressure on the border, and as ‘helping’ the Tibetans within a larger policy framework of coaxing the Chinese out of their isolation.
• The Indian government had made it clear in Parliament that not only the direct frontier with Tibet, but also the frontiers of Nepal, Bhutan and Sikkim, should remain unchanged. 

India’s stand on the issue

• Tibet had become more a ‘psychological’ buffer from a political one during British rule — psychological because Nehru was convinced that any military attack on India from Tibet was not feasible. 
• For him, the status of Tibet and Tibetan autonomy, as also Indian interests in Tibet inherited from the British were issues for discussion with China.
• The problem lay in the fact that, except for Sikkim, the border had not been demarcated — jointly with China — on the ground; the boundary in the western and middle sectors had not been defined in detail by treaty. 
• The McMahon Line was shown only on a map that the Chinese government had initialled in 1914 but not subsequently accepted. 
• Wrong advice: K.M. Panikkar, the then Indian Ambassador to China, advised that the issue would pose no difficulty. 
  • He suggested that the political office in Lhasa should be regularised by its transformation into an Indian Consulate-General. 
  • Other posts and institutions like the telegraph lines set up in the British era, the military escort at Yadong in the Chumbi Valley, ‘were to be abolished quietly in time’.
  • It was an obsession with the big picture of two big Asian nations forging deeper understanding and cooperation. It was a strategic miscalculation that would have serious consequences.
  • It was assumed by India that there was no territorial dispute between India and China.
• While negotiations for an agreement between India and China on Tibet were necessary, they should have also included a border settlement. There should have been a quid pro quo for India’s recognition of Chinese sovereignty over Tibet.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 1

Context:

The recent Global Hunger Report (GHR) 2021 ranks India at 101 out of 116 countries, with the country falling in the category of having a ‘serious’ hunger situation. 

• India is also among the 31 countries where hunger has been identified as serious. 
• India ranked 94 among 107 countries in the Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2020, released last year.
• The ranks are not comparable across years because of various methodological issues and so it is wrong to say that India’s standing has fallen from 94 (out of 107) in 2020. 
• The Government of India refuted the GHI, claiming that it is ‘devoid of ground reality’ and based on ‘unscientific’ methodology. 

Background:

Global Hunger Index (GHI)

• Annual Report: Jointly published by Concern Worldwide and Welthungerhilfe.
• Aim: To comprehensively measure and track hunger at the global, regional, and country levels.
• Calculation: It is calculated on the basis of four indicators
  • Undernourishment (percentage of undernourished in the population (PoU))- it refers to the share of the population of a country that has an insufficient calorie intake. (weight of one-third each)
  • Child wasting – it refers to the share of children under the age of five who have comparatively low weight for their height which reflects acute undernutrition. (one-sixth weightage)
  • Child stunting – refers to the share of children under the age of five who have a low height for their age. This reflects chronic undernutrition among them. (weight of one-third each)
  • Child mortality – it is the mortality rate of children in a country under the age of five. (one-sixth weightage)

Scoring methodology

• The global hunger index determines the score of a country based on the above 4 indicators 100 point scale where zero is the best possible score reflecting no hunger 100 is the worst situation.
• Every country’s GHI score is classified by severity from low to extremely alarming.
• Each indicator is standardised based on thresholds set slightly above the highest country-level values.

Government’s objection

• The Government’s objection to the methodology is that the assessment is based on the results of a ‘four question’ opinion poll, which is not based on facts. 
• But the report is based on the percentage of undernourished in the population -PoU data  of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).
  • PoU is an estimate of the proportion of the population whose habitual food consumption is insufficient to provide the dietary energy levels that are required to maintain a normal active and healthy life. 
  • PoU is estimated taking into account a number of factors such as food availability, food consumption patterns, income levels and distribution, population structure, etc. 
• In the absence of food consumption data in most countries, this indicator is an estimate based on a modelling exercise using available data; therefore, there is some margin of error. 
• Most of the criticism of the FAO’s PoU data has been about how it underestimates hunger rather than over. 

Therefore, while there is scope for a valid discussion on the GHI methodology and its limitations, this objection by the Government is not warranted.

Concerns for India

• Slow rate of progress: India shows a worsening in PoU and childhood wasting in comparison with 2012. It is the PoU figure of 15.3% for 2018-20 that the Government is contesting.
  • Comparable values of the index have been given in the report for four years, i.e., 2000, 2006, 2012 and 2021. 
  • While the GHI improved from 37.4 to 28.8 during 2006-12, the improvement is only from 28.8 to 27.5 between 2012-21. 
  • The partial results of the National Family Health Survey-5 (2019-20) also show that stunting and wasting indicators have stagnated or declined for most States for which data is available. 
  • The leaked report of the consumption expenditure survey (2017-18) also showed that rural consumption had fallen between 2012-18 and urban consumption showed a very slight increase.
    • The Survey Collects information on the consumption spending patterns of households across the country, both urban and rural.
    • It is conducted by the National Sample Survey Office – NSSO Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation.

COVID-19 impact

• It must also be remembered that all the data are for the period before the COVID-19 pandemic. 
• The situation of food insecurity at the end of the year 2020 was concerning, and things are most likely to have become worse after the second wave. 
• Many of these surveys find that over 60% of the respondents say that they are eating less than before the national lockdown in 2020. 
• Services such as the Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS) and school mid-day meals continue to be disrupted in most areas, denying crores of children the one nutritious meal a day they earlier had access to. 

• Cuts for schemes: The only substantial measure has been the provision of additional free food grains through the Public Distribution System (PDS). 
  • It leaves out about 40% of the population, many of whom are in need and includes only cereals. 
  • Inflation in other foods, especially edible oils, has also been very high affecting people’s ability to afford healthy diets. 
  • On the one hand, while we need additional investments and greater priority for food, nutrition and social protection schemes, Budget 2021 saw cuts in real terms for schemes such as the ICDS and the mid-day meal.
    • Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) is an Indian government welfare programme that provides food, preschool education, and primary healthcare to children under 6 years of age and their mothers.
    • The Midday meal scheme (under the Ministry of Education) is a centrally sponsored scheme that was launched in 1995.

• It is the world’s largest school meal programme aimed to attain the goal of universalization of primary education.
• The national Mid-Day Meal Scheme in government and aided schools popularly will now be known as PM POSHAN Scheme and will also cover students of balvatikas or pre-primary classes

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 2

Context:

The chief of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) Authority has accused the U.S. of sabotaging the multi-billion dollar project, the economic lifeline of Pakistan.

Background

• The ambitious CPEC was launched in 2015 when Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Pakistan. 
• It aims to connect western China with the Gwadar port in southwestern Pakistan through a network of roads, railways and other projects of infrastructure and development.

Key Points

• From the Pakistan point of view of the emerging geostrategic situation, one thing is clear: the United States supported by India is inimical to CPEC.  
• Islamabad is the seventh-largest recipient of Chinese overseas development financing with 71 projects worth $27.3 billion underway as part of the CPEC.
• The U.S. and India continue to “make attempts to manoeuvre Pakistan out of” China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) under which the Chinese government has been investing heavily in about 70 countries.

Significance of Belt and Road Initiative 

• In the wake of the global slowdown, BRI offers a new model of development to China to maintain its economic growth. OBOR envisions building networks of roadways, railways, maritime ports, power grids, oil and gas pipelines, associated infrastructure projects which helps the Chinese economy.
• BRI has a domestic and international dimension: as it visualises a shift from developed markets in the west to developing economies in Asia, Africa And a shift in China’s development strategy concentrating on provinces in central and western China instead of the developed east coast region.
• Strategically important as China utilizes its economic clout to build its soft power.

Criticism and Issues with Belt and Road Initiative 

• Debt-trap diplomacy of China where BRI projects are pushing recipient countries into indebtedness and do not transfer skills or technology. For instance, Hambantota port, where Sri Lanka was forced to lease the port to China for 99 years. Also, there has been rethinking of projects in Malaysia, Maldives, Ethiopia and even in Pakistan.
• BRI represents the political and economic ambitions of China, making countries like the US, Japan, Germany, Russia, and Australia unhappy about the impact of Beijing’s moves on their own economic and political interests.
• China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), an important component of BRI, passes through Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir, which is the main reason for India signalling its displeasure over BRI and not participating in both the BRFs.

Context:

• Kerala and Uttarakhand are reliving their flood nightmares of recent years.
  • Over 80 people have lost their lives in these two States, with crops and property worth thousands of crores being destroyed.

Background

• In 2018, Kerala lost nearly 500 people to floods, while in Uttarakhand a greater number of pilgrims were washed away in the swirling waters of the Bhagirathi, Mandakini and Alaknanda in 2013.
• These might have been epochal disasters, but cloudbursts, flash floodsand very heavy rain in September and October have become the norm.
  • It coincides with the now-destructive retreating Southwest monsoon and cyclones originating in both the Bay of Bengal and Arabian Sea.

Impacts 

• This is leading to crop losses as well.
• The ‘unseasonal’ rain could impact the output of tea, coffee, rubber, and cardamom in Kerala, besides West Bengal’s premium rice variety, Gobindobhog.
• It is expected to have damaged soybean, onion, urad, moong and cotton crops in central India.
• Climate change is here; scientists attribute the extreme weather events to the warming of our oceans, the Arabian Sea in particular in recent times.
• Its economic effects cannot be wished away any more.